Learning some, teaching some

My little daughter has been teaching me a few lessons in virtue, just as she is learning from me about the world around her.

Some examples:
1) Early to bed and early to rise. The basic lesson. Further, get up when you are awake. Don't keep lying around in bed.
2) Eat only when you are hungry. Stop eating the moment you are full. No overeating please!
3) Have an open, scientific curiousity about everything around you. No inhibitions, try everything, fearlessly.
4) If you don't like something, say it. If you love something, express it with uninhibited affection and smiles. No hypocrisy.

If babies come to life with these simple virtues, I wonder at what stage social conditioning turns them into the adults that we have become. The human mind sets us apart from animals, at the same time makes us the calculative, cunning individuals that we are. We are just as straightforward as animals when we are born. But as we grow up, our 'habits' change, our living standards deteriorate, our inquisitiveness gives way to cynicism, and love and affection becomes conditional and reciprocative! Children are capable of demonstrating that life can be as simple as we want it to be. If only. Sigh!